On the Feast of the Nativity of Our Lord, 1921.Abbaye de S. Pierre de SolesmesQuarr Abbey RydeIsle of Wight

MUSIC FOURTH YEARPREFACEIn the earlier volumes of this series, we have sought to lay a solid foundation in tone, pitch and musical appreciation upon which might rest solidly the great art which we now approach directly, the art which is to enrich the child’s devotional life by an understanding of, and participation in, the liturgical prayer of the Church. The music which is the subject of the present book is that in which the Church has embodied her message from the earliest days of the Christian era, which she has safeguarded through the centuries as her official form of musical expression, and through whose strains today, linked to the wordsof her liturgy, she teaches and prays, meditates, mourns and jubilates.That this music has a natural place in the curriculum of our Catholic schools is becoming increasingly evident in our day when the discoveries of modern science are leading us into a fuller appreciation of those methods which the Church has consistently used in the transmission of her message.* Since appropriate feeling is necessary to assimilation, it must be as necessary to the assimilation of religious truth as it is to other branches. Thus we understand the importance which the Church has always attached to an appropriate musical expression of her dogma; we understand her insistance upon music of a specifickind, which will not merely stimulate the feelings in a general way, but will embody her dogma in an appropriate form of expression. If a further reason were needed for the inclusion of this subject in the curriculum, we have it in the urgent plea of the highest authority in Christendom.The function of Church music, according to Pope Pius X, is summed up in the words “vivificare·et fecundare”. There are two ways in which we may expect music to add life and efficacy to the text; the one is by an enrichment of the doctrinal content through symbolic use of themes; the other, by supplying that power, that energizing force, which feeling adds to a merely intellectual concept. xTo these two functions we might add a third which is to cultivate an ability todistinguish between different types of emotional appeal, and respond only to thehighest. All these are essential elements to be considered in the educationalfunction of music.In all three respects the chant of the Church stands supreme. It enriches the doctrinal content by lifting into consciousness, in a new significance, certain associated ideas by means of a series of sound pictures taken from mystically related offices. We have an example of this type of enrichment in the Mass for the Dead. Here the music is a living tissue of related sound pictures which add to the content of the printed or spoken word, bringing a message of consolation and of hope to the ear attuned to receive it. As we sing the Tract and ask that the soul of the deceased may be forgiven his sins and helped by divine grace to reach eternal joy, the melody lifts into conciousness the scenes which ushered in the dawn of Our Lord’s resurrection — the Chosen Vine, the power of the Wordof God, the hart panting for the fountains of waters, and finally the shout 01triumph of Holy Saturday, ” Laudate Dominum omnes gentes”. But should the mind fail to catch these symbolic applications, it can hardly fail to realize the mystical intent whereby the melody of the Gradual Requiem aeternam is almost an exact replica of the triumphant Gradual of Easter. Here our appeal that the soul may reach eternal light is expressed jn the same strains which, at Easter,announced the Day which the Lord had made for exultation and joy; we assure ourselves that the soul of the just is held in eternal remembrance and cannot be touched by the powers of evil in the same strains which, at Easter, expressed our confidence in God’s goodness and His everlasting mercy. This close linking together in melodic identity of death with Resurrection, and with that one supreme victory over death which is the hope of the individual soul, is more realistic and more convincing in music than it could be through any mere verbal connection, and as a matter of fact the words attempt no such exact parallel.The implication is there, but the music makes it explicit. Indeed the music goes a step further in its suggestive power, and reminds us of the Guardian Angel whose loving care is untouched by death; it weaves in a mystical reference to the eternal marriage feast of the Lamb to raise the hearts of those who know the Gradual of the Mass pro Sponso et Sponsa. Thus does the · music enrich the doctrinal content by what might b e called a symbolic code of cross references.Through her music, moreover, the Church supplies us with a key to the different degrees and qualities of feeling which distinguish one season from another, one feast from another. It teaches us not only when, but how, she mourns; not only when, but how, she jubilates. Much of this is conveyed by the music alone. For example, the single word u Alleluia” recurs constantly throughout the liturgical year. In the printed or spoken word there is nochange from season to season. The music alone supplies the commontary on the text, and conveys the difference of quality between the joy of one season and another, of one feast and another. Here we find the rainbow shades of the Church’s moods, translated into music — clothed with infinite variety. From the tentative and humble tones of the Alleluia of Holy Saturday when the soul can hardly believe in its own salvation, when the price of the sacrifice is yet too close at hand to forget the pain which won our triumph — through the gradual crescendo of joy and exultation to the Ascension; through the mystical renewalof Pentecost; and the innocent— almost naive — rejoicings of Christmas; —all these shades of feeling are contained in the music, which gives its true character to the unchanging word, vivifying the letter, which killeth, by adding the spirit, which giveth life.All this is educative in the highest sense, and if music is the education oF feeling, this particular music is, and must remain, par excellence, the education of Catholic feeling. Through its aid the children in our schools will learn to recognize the distinction between Christian and pagan feeling. Music will become for them, not a series of more or less pretty sounds to delight in, but an intellectual and symbolic code, — raising their minds and hearts to the standard of the Church’s thought and the standard of her feeling. If it is the function of the Catholic school to form their minds through sound doctrine, it must be no less its function to form their hearts through sound feeling, that there may be no contradiction between truth and its expression. Failing this, the heart,— seeking beauty, — may perchance find .satisfaction elsewhere, and dogma,— become inarticulate, — may sicken and die.This explains the psychological basis of the Church’s insistence on a particular form of music. She did not leave to chance this formation of the emotions, but, taking the arts to herself, she shaped them to her own purpose. 3This explains the words of Pope Pius X when he set before us Gregorian Chant as the”type or norm ” of Christian musical prayer, and its function to ” raise and form the heart of the faithful to all sanctity “. There is, then, a classical standard or type of Christian expression as there is a classical standard or type of Christian life. As the Saints and Martyrs are placed before us as models for our imitative faculties in the realm of Christian life and action, so in Gregorian Chant we are given models for our imitative faculties in the realm of Christian feeling, by which to orientate our emotion.

In Music Fourth Year, we give the children in germinal form the basic principles of this great and subtle art. Our purpose is, not merely to teach them to sing one or two Masses correctly, or even beautifully, but rather, while studying these Masses, to lay a foundation which will open to them, ultimately, the whole musical drama of the liturgical year. From this basis the books which are to follow will unfold: one series dealing with the history and literature of secular music, the other dealing with the liturgical music of the Church. Bothseries have their roots in the liturgical chant. The present book lays the basis for congregational singing of those parts of the Mass which the Church has allotted to ” the people”, namely, the responses, the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo,Sanctus and Agnus Dei. Subsequent volumes of the liturgical series will deal with the Proper of the Mass, with that portion for which the Church assumes a selected body of singers rather than the whole congregation of the faithful.The secular series is also a direct outgrowth of this study. The time has passed when music may be studied as though it had first seen the light of day in the fifteenth century and had developed from that date to the present: Such a presentation ignores, not only the music of classical times — of which but little remains to us, — but further ignores more than a thousand years of medieval music of which we possess a vast and significant literature which represents to the student of music what the Gothic Cathedral represents to the student of architecture — namely the efflorescence of the Christian spirit in terms of his particular art, before the Renaissance substituted naturalistic expression for symbolic expression and thereby brought about the divorce of art from religion.But in spite of this separation we still find the roots of these modern secular arts thrust deep into the heart of the liturgy. From the liturgy sprang the mystery plays, the moralities, and from them the modern secular drama, oratorio and opera. From the ancient ecclesiastical modes, in their rich variety and subtlely,were deduced the two modern scales as a compromise to serve the needs of modern harmony. From the free and soaring flight of Gregorian rhythm was deduced the system of measure divisions as a convenience to serve the needs of polyphonic singers. And now we find modern composers tracing back to Gregorian sources the models for the various musical forms of modern music.Vincent d’Indy in a recent article 4 traces back to Gregorian sources such forms as the independent balanced phrase, the song-form, the suite, the rondo and the variation. “I maintain,” he writes, “that Gregorian Chant not only has had a strong influence upon modern musical art but nas directly given it birth, since all the forms — symphonic and dramatic — which have succeeded each other in the course of the centuries, and whose authorship have been attributed to this composer or that, existed already in a clearly defined and characteristic manner in the more beautiful of the Gregorian melodies, which melodies indeed for a thousand years were the sum total of all music.”

Thus purely from the viewpoint of the modern musician we require the background of the Chant — its tonalities, rhythm and form, for in music, as in other branches, a treatment, which singles out a particular period for exclusive attention, arrives at a false perspective and unbalanced viewpoint. Those musical principles which might appear axiomatic to a student whose researches were limited to four or five centuries, might appear questionable to one whose .viewpoint took in twenty, in the case of our schools, we propose to give the children truth in germinal form — but the germs must be those of complete truth,not merely of half truths born of the fashion of a day.The music work for the Fourth Year is embodied in two text books : i) the present volume, which contains a series of graded exercises in rhythm and notation, which will prepare the children to sing easily and intelligently from the official books of the Church; 2) the Kyriale sen Ordinarium Missae in the official musical notation of the Church, enriched by the rhythmic signs of Solesmes.Both these books should be placed in the hands of the children. This division of the matter into two volumes has been made in order to facilitate the use of the Kyriale at Mass, and thus encourage the children to fulfill the purpose of this study by taking an active part in the liturgical singing.The technique to be acquired in the Fourth Year is largely rhythmical. The child will have acquired in the earlier grades a grasp of tonal relationships, a beautiful vocal production; an understanding of time as represented by the modern measure and, to some extent, of the larger unit of the phrase. The Fourth Book carries him a step further, into that ethereal rhythm which overrides measure, and soars above the earth in a movement as light as the floating of a cloud. 5The approach to rhythm cannot be merely mental. Rhythm is movement,and is acquired largely through the muscle sense. To feel the rhythm of movement, and to get away from the material contrast of loud and soft, requires exercises in movement by the children themselves. They must feel what it is to soar, they must experience the difference between ” beating time ” and measuring it in terms of flight. Each child should be provided with a light veil of tulle or similar filmy material with which to carry out in action the rhythmic exercises of the early chapters. These veils are no mere ornament but a fundamental element in acquiring that vocal lightness, smoothness and legato, that soaringquality, that ethereal flight wherein lies the charm and beauty of the Gregorian phrase. The eye helps the ear, and the muscle sense reinforces both. Not only are the veils essential at the early stages, but they serve as a corrective throughout, should the voices become heavy, or the accents too material. The teacher should not be satisfied until a smooth, gentle, fluid style is acquired.The exercises of the early chapters should be repeated, and returned to daily,until perfection is attained. They should be attacked boldly, at first, — not tentatively, — and then gradually be refined and perfected.Free rhythm has laws of its own, which are largely the laws of correct speech.The basis of good singing is good reading. Before attempting to sing any of the liturgical chants, the child should understand the meaning of the words and learn to read them aloud in Latin with intelligent phrasing. The pronunciation should be smooth, even, quiet, and they should bring out with a slight and very gradual crescendo the principal accent of the phrase. The next step is to read the phrase on a single musical tone, keeping the same delicate crescendo in rising to the principal accent, and letting the last syllabe of the phrase drop almost unheard. This sense of the phrase must become automatic, for there isnothing more destructive of the spirit of Gregorian Chant than a separate staccato attack of each syllable. The essential thing is to maintain a perfect legato, as on a stringed instrument, and never to sing as though by blows as on a piano. On the other hand, it is equally incorrect to draw out some syllables unduly, at the expense of others. The syllables must be of approximately even length, though not mechanical, and their rhythmic relation to each other must be felt and clearly expressed.This book follows the same method as the earlier books of the series,proceeding from the simple to the complex, from the known to the related unknown, and presenting each new idea through practical experience before the memorized formula. The exercises of the early chapters seek to detach the children from a necessary association of accent with stress, and to give them an experimental knowledge of accent produced by a rising melody. The fundamental exercises in the rhythm of movement are also introduced. During this stage the familiar numbers are used as symbols of the tones. As soon as thenew ideas have been grasped we proceed to the study of the notation used by the Church in her official books.In acquiring the new rhythm the process is as follows:1. Gestures; broad sweeping movements with veils during which the objectis to feel the alternate lift and weight, energy and repose.2. The curves drawn on the board to music in which will be revealed anyangularity or jerkiness which may exist in the voice.3. The finer, subtler rhythm of the voice after the elementary concepts havebeen acquired through gesture; at this time the movements should be slight, with the hand only, so as not to disturb the vocal smoothness.

The arrangement of the chapters of Music Fourth Year differs from that of the preceeding books in so far as the chapters no longer represent the work of one week, but only developmental stages in study. The teacher’s attention is also drawn to a change in the vocalise syllable which has previously been represented by the letters Noo (pronounced as is the word Noon) which is now represented by the syllable Nuy the u pronounced as in Latin (as in the English word rude).In our presentation of the liturgical chant we have followed the rhythmic principles of the Reverend Father Dom Andre Mocquereau of Solesmes through whose genius and scholarly researches of half a century he has given to the world a simple and artistic approach to this ancient music. It is a pleasure to express to this great Master my profound gratitude for his generous help in the work of recasting the matter in a form suited to children, and for his kindness in personally marking the rhythm for all the melodies included in this book as well as his permission to use matter already copyrighted.Among those to whom special gratitude is due are the Very Reverend Father Abbot of Solesmes for his kindness in placing at my disposal while at Quarr Abbey every facility for successful study; the Reverend Father Subercasseaux of Solesmes and the Reverend Mother Louise de Langavant of the Abbey of Sainte Cecile for the beautiful pictures made especially for this volume; and to Messrs. Desclée et Cie, for permission to use material of which they hold the copyright.

JUSTINE WARD

(ETRE CONTINUE)

NOTES

1. “Psychology is revealing to the educators of today the fact that a concious content strictly confined to the intellect lacks vitality and power of achievement. Every impression tends by its very nature to flow out in expression, and the intellectual content that is isolated from affective consciousness will be found lacking in dynamo-genetic content because it has failed to become structural in the mind and remains external thereto. From the evidence in this field we may safely formulate as a fundamental educative principle : that the presence in consciousness of appropriate feeling is indispensable to mental assimilation.” (Shields-Philosophy of Education.)

X” The Church, in her teaching, reaches the whole man: his intellect, his will, his emotions,his senses, his imagination, his aesthetic sensibilities, his memory, his muscles, and his powers of expression. She neglects nothing in him : she lifts up his whole being and strengthens and cultivates all his faculties in their interdependence.” (Shields-Philosophy of Education, p. 314.)

3″ The Church, in her teaching, reaches the whole man: his intellect, his will, his emotions,his senses, his imagination, his aesthetic sensibilities, his memory, his muscles, and his powers of expression. She neglects nothing in him : she lifts up his whole being and strengthens and cultivates all his faculties in their interdependence.” (Shields-Philosophy of Education, p. 314.)

4.Revue des Jeunes¡ March 1922.

5 ” It is not easy, in our day, to describe rhythm, and particularly the free musical rhythm of Gregorian Chant, because even those educated musicians who vaguely sense in practice the beauties of rhythm, recognise in theory nothing beyond measure. Our modern text books deal merely with the study of measures and fail to rise to the conception of the ancients regarding a rhythmic movement animating all music and all speech. ” (Dom Andre Moquereau — Introduction ” Nombre Musical Grégorien “, page 19.)” Like the classical Greek musiciens, we must distinguish between form and matter in rhythm.By matter is meant the tones, the words, the motions of the body… which are capable of taking on a rhythmic character. In themselves these substrata of rhythm are not rhythmic, but they can be made to take on a rhythmic form, according to the creative will of the artist. “ÍDom Andre Mocquereau — Nombre Musical Grégorien.)

according to the principles of DOM ANDRE MOCQUEREAU OF SOLESMESBY JUSTINE WARD